


The Golden Bird

by Her_Madjesty



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Author has a Slight Golden Deer Bias, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Inspired By "The Golden Apple" as translated by the Brothers Grimm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-24 05:09:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30067155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Her_Madjesty/pseuds/Her_Madjesty
Summary: Once upon a time, a gnarled tree grew in the midst of a sprawling garden.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd & My Unit | Byleth, Edelgard von Hresvelg & My Unit | Byleth, My Unit | Byleth & Claude von Riegan
Kudos: 12





	The Golden Bird

**Author's Note:**

> Hello all! My thanks here, primarily, to the wonderful mods, artists, and fellow authors affiliated with the Fodlan's Fables zine. This is my piece as it appears in the zine, albeit without the gorgeous art and outstanding graphic design. At the date of posting, I believe that the mods are still offering leftover copies to those who are interested, so [head over to their Twitter and see for yourself!](https://twitter.com/fodlansfables?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor) If nothing else, check out the art that's been posted over there and just...bask in it.
> 
> As mentioned in the tags, this piece is heavily inspired by [The Golden Bird](https://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/175/grimms-fairy-tales/3048/the-golden-bird/), translated by the Brothers Grimm.

Once upon a time, a gnarled tree grew in the midst of a sprawling garden.

This garden was kept by an archbishop, in a monastery at the center of three warring lands. The archbishop had not planted the tree herself, but every year, it would grow the most beautiful golden apples. And every year, the number of apples that the archbishop picked was the same.

That is, until one year.

The lands around the monastery had long been plagued by war, but in recent years, the fighting had worsened. The archbishop, who did not trouble herself with such things, watched and waited for a victor to emerge. In her garden, the golden apples in the gnarled tree began to grow ripe and rosy.

When she went out to begin her harvest, however, she saw that one of her apples had disappeared. Night after night, it happened again, and her stock slowly dwindled.

Confused and irate, the archbishop called the three lords of the warring lands – Dimitri, Edelgard, and Claude – to the monastery. Once there, she said to them:

“Someone is stealing the apples from my tree. Whichever one of you discovers the thief will receive my blessing and backing in the wars to come.”

The lords, hungry for victory as much as for peace, accepted the archbishop’s challenge. They divided the harvest season among themselves, swearing to watch and win the monastery’s favor.

And so, a tentative peace fell throughout the land.

*

Once upon a time, a golden bird nested in a gnarled tree. The people from the three lands surrounding her nest would walk for miles to see the way her feathers glistened in the sun. Every year, as the apples grew ripe in their orchards and the leaves began to turn, they would leave offerings for her to eat through the winter.

*

During the early weeks of the harvest, Edelgard and her select few took to the monastery's garden. They walked among the archbishop’s careful plots and kept their eyes fixed to the garden’s gates, waiting for a thief to arrive.

Above their heads and out of view, a golden bird circled in the sky. Only when the guards had dispersed through the garden did she descend, settling in the branches of the gnarled apple tree.

Edelgard turned at the sound of rustling leaves, her unforgiving axe at the ready. The bird, unmoving in the tree, did not flinch as the blade whirled past her unadorned head.

The young lord blinked, then winced as one of the tree’s branches came tumbling to the ground.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded of the bird. “Are you the thief I’m meant to look for?”

The bird tilted her head, the picture of confusion. Her form shimmered, and then Edelgard stood face to face with a bold and stone-faced woman.

“Who are you?” the bird-woman echoed, circling the lord. “And why do you make to hurt myself and my tree?”

Edelgard fell back, her axe going limp in her hand. “I am no one,” she lied, all the while looking for her guard across the garden. “But if you are the thief, you must know: you will not leave this garden again.”

The bird-woman stopped her circling, eyeing the lord’s axe with care. Then, haughty, she straightened her spine and walked back to the gnarled tree. She looked at the lord and, with a swift leap, took a golden apple in her hand.

Edelgard lunged. Before she could make contact – before her guard had time to react – there was no more woman in the garden, just the shadow of a bird taking flight into the night.

For the next several nights, the lord and her guard would prowl the banisters, bows at the ready for the bird-woman’s return. But by the end of her watch, she had not captured the bird, and the apples continued to disappear. And so the archbishop dismissed the lord from her sight.

*

Once upon a time, a motherless woman came walking to a place with a gnarled tree. Here, she found a golden bird, and beneath the bird, a harvest of golden apples.

The motherless woman, struck with grief and ambition, drove the bird away from her tree. She built walls, unrelenting and tall, and tilled the ground until it gave forth a crop worthy of a king. Before long, the memory of the golden bird was forgotten, and the people of the three surrounding lands flocked only to the gnarled tree to see the gardens that had sprung up around it.

*

For the next long while, the lord Dimitri and his guard patrolled the archbishop’s garden. They watched, their first night, as the golden bird returned to her roost. They did not stop her as she plucked an apple away, nor as she fled from their steely armor into the night sky.

It was not until the third night of their watch, in fact, that the lord dared to approach her. He stood before the gnarled tree as she came to settle, his arms crossed over his chest.

When the bird did not immediately take flight, he approached. “Your ladyship,” Dimitri called out. “Why is it that you would show yourself to Edelgard and not to me?”

The bird ruffled her feathers, and then she was a woman, dressed in the light of the moon. She looked down at the lord from her perch in the tree, one hand grazing over the wound Edelgard had left behind.

“Who are you,” she called back, “that would demand my attention?”

“My name is Dimitri,” the lord replied. “I am here to seek solace for my lands and peace for this monastery. You’re draining the archbishop’s spirits, with how you steal from her so.”

The bird-woman only looked confused. “How can I steal from her,” she asked, “why I was here first?”

Dimitri furrowed his brow, but he did not have time to respond. One of his guard, watching from the banister, saw her moment and took it. An arrow embedded itself in the tree next to the woman, and within a moment, she was gone.

“Wait!” Dimitri shouted, but the bird-woman was already gone, her golden feathers glinting in the night sky.

He tried to earn her trust in the nights that came after, but the bird-woman remained a bird from then on. By the end of his watch, the apples continued to disappear. And so the archbishop dismissed the lord from her sight.

*

Once upon a time, a golden bird flew from land to land, trying to find a new place to take her rest.

First she went south, where the sun warmed her feathers, but she could not call it home. Then, she went north, where the winter bit deep, and she could not call it home. Then, she went east, where the air filled with salt, but she could not call it home.

Then, she went back to the heart, with its gnarled tree and golden apples, and she began to hatch a scheme.

*

During the final days of the harvest, no representatives from the third of the lands patrolled the garden’s borders. The failure of the two previous lords drove even the most cunning back to their homes for the fall.

Save for one.

The lord Claude sat at the base of the gnarled apple tree. He kept a flask of wine at his side, a book in his hand, and his bow near his feet. As the moon rose in the sky every night, he tore through myth and legend, trying to find mention of a golden bird in the monastery's many tomes.

Above him, the golden bird settled in her tree. She would never linger, wary now that two lords had approached her with malicious intent. But this one never tried to shoot her nor call her to his side. And so the bird, confused, found relief in his silence, and grew comfortable with his presence in the garden.

As harvest season drew to an end, the number of apples dwindled. When only two remained, Claude stood from his spot beneath the tree and spent the evening waiting for the golden bird to return.

When she made herself comfortable in the branches above his head, he looked at her and waved a hand.

“Hi,” he said with a crooked smile. “Tell me: do you feel like company tonight?”

The bird, surprising by the sound of his voice, hesitated in her place. When the lord made no move against her, she dropped to a lower branch and was, for a moment, human again.

“Who are you,” she asked, “that you would ask this question?”

“My name is Claude,” said the lord with a bow. “I have heard and read the stories they tell about you, ladyship, and if they are true, then asking permission to join you is the least I can do.”

The bird-woman let out of a huff that may have been confused and may have been amused; Claude, his head still bowed, could not tell. It wasn’t until he heard her feet hit the ground that he dared to look her way.

The bird-woman looked less like a bird, teetering on two legs, than she did another person. Her hair was not golden in the light of the moon but as dark as the sky itself.

When she did not speak, he came to sit at her feet. The night passed in silence, with the two of them sharing their space until the sun rose again. Only before she left did the bird-woman take an apple in hand.

When the moon rose, the next night, Claude left his bow and his wine behind. He waited beneath the gnarled tree, staring at the last apple that hung from its branches.

The bird-woman greeted him with a gentle trill, beautiful as ever in her feathered form. Claude lifted a hand in greeting, only coming closer once she had settled in the branches.

It wasn’t until she was human again that he dared reach out and pluck the last of the apples from the tree. He watched her eyes widen with shock as he cleaned it against his shirt, then offered it to her.

“Who are you,” she asked again, “that you would do this thing?”

“A man familiar with war,” the lord said. “But who are you, that would look to make it with the archbishop here?”

The bird-woman stared at the apple in his hand, then took it carefully in her own. She did not answer, but bit into it, instead.

“I have been called many things,” she said, once the apple was gone. “But this tree has long been my home, and I would like to take it back again.”

Claude smiled and held out his arm. It was not a woman who took it, but a golden bird who dug her talons into his wrist.

“I’m no stranger to alliances,” said Claude as he led her from the garden. “Let’s see what you and I can do for one another, hm?”

*

Once upon a time, a golden bird looked down on a warring land, trying to find a home. Though it would take many years, she would make her way back to her gnarled tree and its golden apples. Only then, when the sun rose and settled in her unmolested feathers, would the lands around her find peace again.


End file.
